Lauren Sparks

The Sparks Notes

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Going Forward with Some Changes

October 13, 2023 by Lauren 8 Comments

After much thought and prayer, I have decided it is time for me to step back from the Grace and Truth Link Up.  It has been a joy and privilege to host so many great writers and serve alongside these other amazing authors.  To be honest, my heart is just not in it right now.  My attentions are elsewhere and it’s showing in my writing.  The quality of my content has slipped and it makes me sad.  When writing about my God and King I should be doing it with excellence.  So I’m making some changes.

 

What Does This Mean for You Going Forward?

 

If you are a writer, please visit one of my co-hosts (information at the bottom of this post) on Fridays to keep linking up your fantastic Christian content.  This community is such an encouragement.  And if you write a blog and haven’t been linking up, please give it a try!  I don’t think you’ll be sorry.

 

For the readers, I will still be writing.  But dropping out of the link up will allow me to write when true inspiration hits and not have to crank out content on a schedule.  Posting every Friday (and twice a week for a time) was not difficult when I had more time to devote to it, but the ideas are not coming as quickly as I spend more time working, looking for more work and volunteering at church.  And that’s OK.  It’s just a different season for me and I can’t keep on as if nothing has changed.  I believe God has other things out there for me and my time must be devoted to pursuing those things.

 

This blog will stay alive and well.  But you will no longer be receiving a post every Friday if you subscribe.  But stay with me.  When I do publish, it will still come to your inbox, just with less frequency and on a more random schedule.  I am so very thankful for those of you who take the time to read and don’t mind me popping up in your email.  And your kind words and thoughtful comments always mean so much to me.

 

What’s Next Going Forward?

 

I would love your prayers as I continue in the new things God has so kindly placed in my lap.  And as I keep searching for a job that’s right for me.  I am still reachable here by commenting on a post, or by using the CONTACT tab at the top of this page.  I would love to hear from you, get updates or share prayer requests.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart for being my online community.  Every post you read, every time you shared and every comment you left has meant so much to me.  And this is not goodbye.  Just, I’ll see you a little less often.

 

And now for my last time, here is this week’s feature from the link up!

 

Barbara Lee Harper tackled a tough subject with such wisdom in When You Can’t Set Everything Right.

 

The Link Up

1. Share 1 or 2 of your most recent CHRISTIAN LIVING posts. (No DIY, crafts, recipes, or inappropriate articles.) All links are randomly sorted.

2. Comment on 1 or 2 other links. Grace & Truth linkup encourages community.

3. Every host features one entry from the previous week. To be featured, include this button or link back here on your post (mandatory to be featured, but not to participate).

Grace and Truth_Meet Hosts

We encourage you to follow our hosts on their blogs or social media.

MAREE DEE – Embracing the Unexpected
Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest

LAUREN SPARKS
Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest

LISA BURGESS – Lisa notes
Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest

TAMMY KENNINGTON – Restoring hope. Pursuing peace.
Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest

 Now Let’s Link Up!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

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Mrs. Write

September 14, 2018 by Lauren 40 Comments

Photo by Nick Morrison on Unsplash

I recently chewed on the following question from someone:

“If you knew no one would ever read what you write, would you:

Not write at all

Write a bit less

Write a lot more?”

 

I don’t really know how to answer this.  I do know that the first option – not writing at all – is really no option for me at all.  I have loved writing almost as long as I can remember and my brain just thinks in terms of narrative and analogy and phrasing.

 

Poetry was my first love.  An elementary school assignment helped me discover that rhyming came easy for me.  I composed my first verses about the game of softball.  A ballad along the lines of “Casey at the Bat”.  At 9 years old, it’s what I knew.  And I still have it if you ever need a giggle.  In middle school, I wrote about what I longed to know – middle school boys.  My poems dripped with the weird feelings and angsty emotions I couldn’t really understand.  Impressed by my talents, my girlfriends even requested I write poems for them about the boys THEY liked.  I usually obliged.  I penned a few about my growing devotion for God, too.  But at the risk of sounding falsely righteous, unrequited love remained my favorite topic.

 

I joined the Creative Writing Club in high school (What?  It was cool…ish) and enjoyed assignments for English and Literature classes.  Until my senior year when my Honors English teacher tried to wring every ounce of creative zeal out of my body and leave me out to dry.  I know that sounds dramatic, but I don’t say it lightly.  Both of my parents taught public school in the same district I attended.  They frowned upon complaining about teachers, but sided with me on this one.  After a year of harsh critique and criticism, I burned out and took a break from pen wielding while enjoying all college had to offer (a little too much) and falling in love with my husband.

 

I got pregnant with Shelby during the first year of our marriage and kept a pregnancy journal for her.  During those months, jotting down what I experienced and felt for her reignited my passion for words.  So passionate was I, in fact, about that notebook that I frightened my poor husband to death with a wailing phone call after our new puppy chewed it up.  What can I say?  Pregnancy hormones.

 

As we made plans for me to stay home and care for our first child, we looked for ways to cut costs.  The relatively new, exciting and slow (remember dial-up?) internet offered me a job writing online devotionals for a Christian website.  Unfortunately, these folks were a little ahead of their time.  Not many people did their reading digitally in the year 2000 and the money ran out quickly.  But my first paycheck was the exact amount I owed my OB/GYN after taxes for delivering my baby.  Only God.

 

When we moved to the big city for Shelby’s medical care, a new church family blessed me by using my gift for articles and newsletters in the Women’s Ministry.  A few years later, a charitable organization offered us the opportunity to fund raise for research to benefit Dravet Syndrome in Shelby’s name.  I birthed a blog to help with those efforts called “Shelby’s Fast Feet”.  I wrote about her and this disorder and life as a special needs mom.  That blog became “The Sparks Notes” as I continued to write about Shelby but also felt called to share other details of my life and the ways God moves in it.  And now I continue to write about Jesus and family and friends and all the things here at laurensparks.net.

 

Several of you kind friends have asked me how I’m progressing with my latest passion project – writing a book.  The simple answer is…slow.  I let this frustrate me initially, but I refuse to allow it that power anymore.  The truth is I am a mom and a wife with 2 part time jobs.  And right now writing has to fit around the edges of all that.  And I’m writing about friendship.  So I’m not going to pass on the opportunity to share in fellowship and community with someone else so I can sit at the keyboard.  That defeats the purpose of the message I believe God is whispering through me.  And you know what?  The more time I spend with the material and the more time I spend with the real people, the more He opens my eyes to the incompleteness of the lessons He continues to teach me on community. 

God keeps molding me and writing the story He wants to tell.

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 In Ephesians 4:1 Paul says, “I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.”  So I keep living, and seeking and loving and typing, while waiting expectantly for the end result, which may be much different than the book I initially flushed out.

 

In the mean time, I write here, knowing that as long as I write to tell other’s about the love of Jesus, I walk in obedience to the call on my life.  So for those of you sweet enough to still be reading, stay tuned.  And if you want to grab coffee or lunch, I’m your girl.  Research, you know 😉

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About Me

I love Jesus, my husband and caffeine. The order of these can change depending on how tired I am. When my two daughters, stepson, and 4 grandchildren get to be too much, I practice yoga. God graciously allows me to share our adventures, victories and flub-ups from my laptop. May He be glorified here.
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